RAMALLAH, 13 March — Violence in the Middle East spiraled to new heights yesterday as Israeli troops reoccupied most of the West Bank city of Ramallah and raided a northern Gaza Strip town, while gunmen opened fire on an Israeli vehicle in northern Israel.
As the death toll rose to a total of 31 Palestinians, seven Israelis and two unidentified gunmen, Tuesday became the bloodiest day in 17 months of violence between the two sides — only days after the latest casualty record was set.
Continuing its worst acts of savagery against the Palestinians since the start of the intifada (uprising), Israel tanks and heavily-armed troops then reoccupied Ramallah, sparking panic and fear among Palestinians, and killing at least six people.
UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan, in his harshest criticism of Israel, told the Jewish state to rein in its attacks on Palestinian civilians and end its “illegal occupation” of Palestinian lands. Annan urged it to stop “the bombing of civilian areas, the assassinations, the unnecessary use of lethal force, the demolitions and the daily humiliation of ordinary Palestinians.”
In an emotional plea delivered at a public meeting of the UN Security Council, Annan said the Middle East death toll had soared to appalling levels and urged leaders on both sides to “lead your peoples away from disaster.” In his toughest message to date to Israel, he said, “You must end the illegal occupation” of lands captured in the 1967 Middle East war. Aides said it was the first time Annan had branded the occupations as illegal.
The cycle of violence threatened to derail US envoy Anthony Zinni’s mission before it starts. The Israeli Army Chief of Staff, Lt. Gen. Shaul Mofaz, told a parliamentary committee the military had thrown 20,000 troops into action in the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Witnesses said 150 tanks thrust overnight into Ramallah and nearby refugee camps, tearing up roads and crushing cars in the main Palestinian commercial and political hub in the West Bank.
Heavy shooting broke out in some parts of the city of more than 200,000, and Israeli helicopter gunships opened fire on the Amari refugee camp on the city’s outskirts. Palestinian President Yasser Arafat remained in his headquarters as the shooting erupted outside.
By midafternoon the usually bustling city streets were empty except for gunmen trying to resist troops who went on house-to-house search of activists, accused by Israel of leading a Palestinian uprising against its occupation.
Israeli troops and tanks had battled their way into the Jabalya refugee camp in the Gaza Strip overnight, killing at least 18 Palestinians, Palestinian hospital sources and witnesses said. People ran screaming for cover down the camp’s warren of alleys as the tanks rumbled into the densely populated camp of about 90,000 people.
The latest deaths came early yesterday afternoon, when gunmen opened fire on Israeli vehicles traveling near the border with Lebanon, killing six Israelis, including a policeman and two women, and injuring six others. Israel Radio said soldiers killed two of the gunmen responsible for the attack, and large reinforcements searched frantically for others.
The army also resumed its bombardment of the Gaza Strip, with helicopter gunships rocketing an aluminum factory in Khan Yunis — killing four people — and police buildings in Rafah, further south. Israeli troops earlier killed four Palestinians near the northern Gaza Strip settlement of Netzarim, while Palestinian gunmen shot dead an Israeli settler and slightly injured another at a roadblock near Jerusalem, Israel Radio reported.
Israeli troops arrested 30 Palestinians in El-Bireh. In Amari, the army conducted house-to-house searches and rounded up all male residents aged 16-45 for questioning in a square. Some of the detainees were forced to stand blindfolded with their hands tied and stripped to their waists, witnesses said. Bulldozers destroyed the Ramallah home of Wafa Idris, the woman bomber who blew herself up in Jerusalem late January.
Israel initially speculated that the attack near the Lebanon border yesterday afternoon was the work of Lebanese resistance fighters who had infiltrated across the border. However, reports from the scene said there was no definite indication that the gunmen had crossed from Lebanon.
